Sharing the Sh*t Sandwich: How to Handle Life’s Icky Moments as a Couple

How do you and your partner share the ick that comes with living life?

Your kitchen gets messy. Over and over. There’re banking details to handle. Your kid needs a ride…again.

You feel like you’re always dealing with the ick. The minutiae. The trivia of life. And your partner never does their fair share.

This causes conflict. Because when it’s icky, no one wants to do it. So, you both procrastinate. Then you neglect the ick. Finally, blame enters the game and you hear yourself shouting at your partner, “You never clean the kitchen. I always have to do it.”

You’ve tried all kinds of things. You’ve tried determining roles for who does what. You’ve tried asking super cleanly for what you want. Still. The kitchen is a mess.

What happens next is why these icky things are so important to deal with. Because we tend to find MEANING in every sensual detail of our lives.

 

You’re making it mean something in your relationship

This meaning-making is great when your partner gives you a kiss hello and you make that mean they’re glad to see you.

But this meaning-making sucks when you see the messy kitchen and you think, “My partner doesn’t love me.”

We’ve all done it, right? We make these neglecting-the-ick-moments mean so much about the health of our relationship.

Why do we do that? I’m gonna answer this in just a moment, but it will make it easier for me to talk about that if I first tell you a story so you know what I mean when I call these moments “sh*t sandwiches.”

 

So, what is a sh*t sandwich?

Liz Gilbert, who wrote Eat, Pray, Love also wrote a book called Big Magic. In that book she tells the story of how she knew she was destined to be a writer.

She was sitting across the table from a colleague, who was complaining about reaching out to agents and following up with publishers. She felt herself say, “I’ll do that. I’ll take that job.”

Liz Gilbert didn’t love reaching out to agents and publishers either, but she saw it as a necessary task to get the thing she did want: a life as a writer. She calls these sorts of tasks sh*t sandwiches because you want the bread of the career, but that career comes with some unpleasant fillings.

A sh*t sandwich. I love the term because it describes so much of life. We want to eat healthy, so we eat the sh*t sandwich of shopping carefully for clean ingredients. We want a beautiful home, so we eat the sh*t sandwich of cleaning the kitchen.

 

Sh*t sandwiches are a part of life and relationships

The life we want often includes a few sh*t sandwiches. This is just how it is.

But then we take this LEAP: If you loved me, you’d eat my sh*t sandwiches for me. Why do we do this?!

Here’s my two cents. If you were lucky enough to be loved by a parent who cleaned up your toys over and over or made you dinner after dinner for YEARS, your first understanding of love is: the person who loves me eats my sh*t sandwiches.

Your map of love comes from your parents. We enter our marriage while still sort of following this map. Oh! If you love me, you’ll eat my sh*t sandwiches for me. Conversely, if you don’t eat my sh*t sandwiches, you must not love me.

You can see the difference between parental love and marital love, right? It’s not fair to ask our partner to eat all (or even most) of our sh*t sandwiches. And yet, that is the map we were given.

Life is full of sh*t sandwiches. Don’t make your partner eat too many sh*t sandwiches. And don’t eat up the sh*t sandwiches for your relationship all by yourself. Bottom line: share the sh*t sandwiches.

 

The power of naming the sh*t sandwiches

One of the things I find fascinating is that everyone feels differently about different tasks. My friend hates the grocery store. I love going grocery shopping.

As soon as I discovered the grocery store was her number one sh*t sandwich, I began to tell her when I was headed shopping. What can I pick up for you?

Often, she’d have a snack waiting for me when I dropped off her groceries because she discovered one of my sh*t sandwiches was unpacking groceries when I’m hungry. I got to do her a favor. She fed me so I had energy to go home and put my own groceries away.

When you name your sh*t sandwich, occasionally your partner will say, “I don’t mind doing that.” And, viola! A match made in heaven. When my husband found out buying airline tickets was one of my sh*t sandwiches, he offered to do that for me.

When you and your partner get used to naming your sh*t sandwiches, one of the secrets you might uncover is that your sh*t sandwich isn’t so bad tasting to your partner and they are happy to help you out.

 

But not every sh*t sandwich can be traded

There are plenty of sh*t sandwiches that none of us want to eat. I’m still in favor of naming them.

Because sometimes you just need to announce: I’m eating a sh*t sandwich right now. It helps to just vocalize the ick.

Side benefit, then your partner knows. They can offer you a backrub later that evening, or simply say, “Oh, poor you. You’re eating a second sh*t sandwich today.” Sometimes we just need the world—and really I mean your partner—to know you’re doing something hard.

Which brings up a great thing you can do for your partner when they’re eating a sh*t sandwich: You can be there for them.

When I need to do eat a tough sh*t sandwich—like read a contract to buy a house (this is the sh*t sandwich I eat because my husband hates it)—I just ask my husband if he’ll sit next to me. Just having his company, even though he’s busy checking his phone, helps me navigate the sh*t sandwich better.

 

Find a way to make the sh*t sandwich better

Another way to make the sh*t sandwiches in life more palatable is to really, really tell yourself the reason it’s worth it to eat this sandwich.

For Liz Gilbert, she wanted more than anything to be a writer, so the task of contacting agents, just became something she did on the way to being a writer.

Simon Sinek would say this is about finding your WHY. He has a great TED Talk about when you know why you’re doing something, it makes those sh*t sandwiches so much easier to eat.

Let’s take a list of possible sh*t sandwiches and improve them by getting really, really clear why we want to eat them:

1. Budgeting

For some people budgeting is a sh*t sandwich. Money is a subject fraught with angst, so anything to do with banking is a sh*tty, sh*tty business. But let’s look at why budgeting might taste good.

You love the feeling of being in control financially. It’s a GREAT feeling when you can buy those new pants you love for cash rather than putting them on a credit card, right? So, the sh*t sandwich that goes with the lovely feeling of paying cash for the fabulous pants is being mindful at the grocery store about what you’re spending.

When you come out of the grocery store, and you’ve stayed within your budget, take time to notice how good that feels. As you’re wheeling your groceries to the car, give yourself a little pep talk. “Thanks, Rebecca, for choosing the less expensive coffee. It feels good to be in control financially.”

2. Giving your child choices

If you have a toddler, you are constantly juggling your toddler’s desires with what is healthy for that child. Consequently, you might be offering a plethora of choices every single day. This can be a sh*tty sandwich simply because it’s overwhelming. Let’s remember why it matters.

You are trying to raise a wonderful grown up. In order to raise a wonderful grown up, you need to teach this little toddler how to see the bigger picture. You want to help this sweet little person find intrinsic desire for the things that make them healthy.

So, you talk with your toddler. “I know you don’t want to take a nap right now. But do you notice how grumpy you’re feeling? It doesn’t feel good to be grumpy. So, when we’re grumpy, we take a rest. Would you like to take your nap with your Bear or your Lamby?”

Finding these arbitrary choices—Bear or Lamby—all day long so that your toddler feels the power to choose as they do the thing that will help them feel better, lays the stage for later in life when your child is navigating their own sh*t sandwiches.

But finding those choices is exhausting. It’s a sh*t sandwich that goes with parenting. You might not feel the consequences of this choice for years. So it helps to notice yourself.

“Hey Rebecca, you’re doing a fabulous job offering so many choices to this toddler! This kiddo is lucky to have you because you’re teaching them to notice their own needs and desires. Well done you.”

These are examples of adulting. When your parents were raising you and teaching you about the map of love, they ate the sh*t sandwiches for you…if you were lucky, that is.

Your parents struggled with money so many times that they realized budgeting was a sh*t sandwich they wanted to eat. Your parents valued exercise because it made them feel healthier overall. And your parents gave you choices as a toddler because they wanted you to one day be able to identify the sh*t sandwiches in your own life and help yourself come up with strategies to get those sh*t sandwiches into your daily routine.

 

Re-frame your sh*t sandwich

Every time you eat a sh*t sandwich and you focus, not on the ick, but rather on the reason you’re doing this onerous task, you will begin to pair that task with the lovely thing you want.

This is what happens for many people with exercise. At first it’s soooo hard to head out the door to take a run. But after months of noticing—truly noticing—how good you feel after that long run, you actually begin to look forward to the run itself.

This is the magic of turning sh*t sandwiches into the perfect sandwich for you.

Here’s three ideas for how to handle sh*t sandwiches in your own life, or in the life of your relationship.

Practice one of the habits, or try all three.

1. Reframe

When you can reframe the sh*t sandwich as just something unpleasant you do on the way to something you really want, it’s not so bad.

A great tool to help you reframe is to ask, why am I doing this? Once you find your why, focus on it. The bigger you make your why, the less icky your sandwich becomes. Because you see the reason for the yucky task.

2. Say “Thank you”

The next way to deal with a sh*t sandwich is when you see your partner eating one, thank them or somehow acknowledge the unpleasant task. It’s amazing how much it helps to have someone nearby, cheering you on when you’re doing something you don’t really want to do.

3. Take one for the team

The number three habit that will REALLY win you points in your relationship is to actually take a sh*t sandwich off your partner’s plate. Do it for them and let them know. “I know you hate buying airplane tickets, so I will happily do that for you.”

Or, if you can’t do the task, you can simply sit next to your partner as they do it. Your companionship really helps.

How about you?

OK. It’s your turn. You know I always love being included in your life. Shoot me a text or leave me a voicemail to tell me what are the sh*t sandwiches at your house? I think it would be fun to have some of those collected for a future episode. My number is 970-210-4480.

I also would love to know your favorite REAL sandwich. Do you agree with me that the sauce is the most important element of a good sandwich?